Elysian Eclipse (The Spore successor?)

 Dare to dream?

In their purest and best form, the job of a video game is to spark the imagination and get people dreaming. Dreaming about being a roguish, ass-kicking, adventurer or a Goomba stomping Italian former-plumber; or maybe even about being an astronaut or a Star Citizen who has their wallets constantly pillaged in a never ending attrition of endless feature creep. (Wait, I think I lost my point a little with that last one; where was I going?) Some games take this to the logical conclusion and give us all the tools to feed our wild imagination and creativity however we so want. Which forms the general conceit for the love around the God Game genre: a type of game where the player assumes the role of omnipotent arbiter across anything from a small tribe of god-fearing faithfuls to an entire budding species. The game I want to talk with you about today is from that latter distinction, a game which proposed to simulate the genesis and evolution of a species from microbe to intergalactic superpower; I'm talking about Spore.

Spore is a game from Maxis, the kings of this sort of game, which really bigged up the idea of becoming the sentient mind behind evolution. Following your species across the various evolutionary stages and making gameplay and creative character building decisions that forms their genetic makeup. Maybe you give your monkey race a herbivore mouth and thus make them capable of only eating plants; how does that inform their intergalactic polices a few thousands of years later? This is the game in which you'll find out! Quietly about consequence and loudly about imagination, Spore captured the hearts of those who saw the cool animations in those daytime history channel documentaries and wandered about the journey of how these microscopic entities could develop into who we are today. In some ways its a educational game, just one with purpose and content, which inherently disqualifies it from being defined as an educational game.

You start off as a Spore on a asteroid that crashes into a fledging planet, and endure one of the most chaotically interesting stages as you battle for food sources in order to grow, as well as to harvest DNA points that can be used to add-on body parts from other slain spore microbes. A coherent gamification of the selective process. This carries onto the more expansive 'creature stage', where you grow legs (or don't if you want to be a slug) and guide your newly minted animals through the world above water, a less frantic 3D version of the spore stage. The tribal and civilisation stages play like RTS and 4X games respectively, with the focus being more on establishing a society and culture from an ostensibly intelligent race. And the Space Stage was the end of the line; an exploration based adventure mode with a slightly undercooked civilisation management meta game tagged on top of the package, this was the reward for enduring the trials of evolution. 

So essentially the game was a collection of minigames strung together to tell a single narrative, but it was an ambitious narrative from start to finish. Each stage could have been further fleshed out into an individual game of it's own, and by tempering the scale of those mods the team built a diverse, if somewhat linear, journey to the stars. Of course the belle of the ball in Spore was the creature maker, which proved to be one of the most impressive feats of design I've ever seen in a character creator. The player could form the shape, spine and appendages of the creature using completely accessible free-form tools, and the resulting abomination would animate and move to the player created specifications. It was marvellous, adaptable, easy-to-use and too impressive to only be used once for one game. And yet it was. Spore launched, didn't do as well as Maxis had hoped, led to the cancellation of 'Dark Spore', and was ultimately never touched again.

Until recently, it would seem. Youtuber and programmer Callum Upton, who apparently also had a space for the majestic Spore game in his childhood, shared his love for the game in a video and, in doing so, inspired one entrepreneuring indie developer to try and make a spiritual successor of their own. Wauzmons, of Seven Ducks Studios, on Itch.io is heading their own title 'Elysian Eclipse' to fill that evolution-game void which has been in our lives, and already we've got out a first demo for what they've been working on. Right now we can see that they've tackled probably the hardest ingredient in this recipe; the creature maker framework itself. The original Spore's systems were marvel's of creativity and ease-of-use, and from the impressions so far it seems that this developer has performed remarkably in their work.

The way that spores systems worked was through these modules of manipulation attached to the core 'body' of the creature that represented it's spine. The globules of matter attached to these modules could be stretched, shrunken or enlarged at the player's whim to form the core shape of the creature. Arms, legs, eyes and stat-granting accessory features could be stuck ontop of this core shape to provide utility, and each limb could be manipulated to a lesser extent, with core modules at points of articulation such as the shoulder, elbow and wrist of an arm. It's simple, but limited. Elysian has done away with the concept of modules and in it's placed introduced a free-form placement system wherein you stick random globules of matter into a conflux, essentially eliminating the original Spore's limitation of a singular core body piece to build off of. If the developer can figure how to make these custom creations actually move with a sensible skeleton (which I haven't seen shown off yet myself, but seems to be the hardest challenge here) then we'll actually have a marked improvement on something the Maxis team did back in 2008. That is an impressive point to build from already.

From the strength of this core system alone I'm encouraged to take this project with a modicum of seriousness, especially given that the breadth of Spore, at least in it's original package, is a collection of connected genre-microcosm-minigames; not exactly reinventing the wheel here at all. The creator system is the huge hurdle, and having mastered that it's might exactly be a downwards slope for the rest of the game, but certainly a even-ground progression for the rest of principle development. Of course then comes the wizardry of bug fixing, optimization and tying systems into one another and that stuff is totally beyond me so I couldn't comment. Also, this is assuming that Elysian Eclipse is intending to follow the Spore formula of basic minigames of grander genre titles, or dev may go crazy and decide to flesh out their minigames and then this game will become the next Star Citizen. But you know what, as long as it doesn't get as greedy as Cloud Imperium did: I'm here for the process.

Serious scope has gone into the planning stages already, with the plan for this game teasing two more stages than Spore even had! An 'Aquatic stage' directly after the cell stage and a 'Medieval' Stage tucked in between 'Tribal' and 'Industrial'. (I assume 'Industrial' is this game's shorthand for 'Civilisation stage') Throw in the planned modding API and multiplayer support, and I'd understand if you find all this to be a bit fantastical of a prospect for an independent team relying on backing from a community for a niche game from The Noughties. I'm torn. I want to believe, but these guys are shooting for the moon. But you know what they say, aim for the moon and end up in stars, right? (Even though that makes no sense on an interstellar level as the stars would be, comparatively, higher than the moon which undercuts the point of the proverb.) It looks interesting, and Spore needs a sequel. I wish the team luck.

Spore

 Don't Panic!

I arrive on a meteor, chucked from the heavens to this lowly rock on the furthest wisp of it's celestial spoke-wheel. All from there, in some way or other, will be a brutal duel from utmost simplicity to advanced sciences, the hounding of 'survival of the fittest' will dog me and others every solitary step of the way until it's rough iron creases out only the final victor. Never perhaps the toughest, nor the meanest, but certainly the most resourceful among us. And ever as we toil, evolving and distending into ugly bizarre fishes, then colourful mammals, and onwards to vicious tribals, the question hounds of 'what comes next', where will be our zenith. Of course how are we to know then, that zenith will obviously be when everything melds and coalesces into a bad Star Trek The Next Generation episode, complete with a faux 'borg' copy and paste job. So perhaps not the preordained 'rulers of creation' we had hoped for, but we'll make do.

I talk a lot about 'scale' and 'scope' whenever it comes to talking about games that I respect from a conceptual level, which I suppose just goes to show right and clear how I feel about titles that try something incredible when other titles that stay relatively safe. (Although that being said, Persona 4 Golden is one of my favourite games of all time for the express reason that it simulates everyday life, so what does that say about me?) And how much more grand can a game possible get, then literally trying to tell the story of evolution from microscopic unicellular amoebas to rulers of the cosmos. (Well, I say rulers; you actually more just end up as desperate freedom fighters struggling against a pre-laid out Stellaris endgame sceanrio) does it get any more sweeping than that? Probably not, which is why I and quite a few others fell for the once unbelievable charms of Maxis' Spore.

Yes, Maxis sometimes made games other than the latest malformed and malnutritional Sims entry, packed with just enough empty promise to fuel hundreds of dollars worth of DLC and DLC for that DLC. (Still can't believe they did that) To say that my respect for Maxis has dropped significantly since the days of early Spore would be a tad of an understatement. When I spied the first trailers for this game I was beside myself, certain to my core that Maxis were visionary geniuses capable of things that no other developer would ever dream off. I drooled over the prospect of the one, true, forever game; wherein you'd tell over and over the simple greatest story in creation; that of creation. Is there any more pure a conclusion for those who lean towards the god game ecosystem, then literally playing a god of evolution? And in many ways little me was right, because simply no developer has tried anything nearly as insane as this concept in the 13 years since. Not even Maxis, who have since gone on to being slave drivers for their Electronic Arts masters. (I miss when games companies got better with time, even though I think I'm starting to realise that never was the case)

In many ways the very idea was like, and I'm sure this was bought up in the planning stages at one point, directing your very own show on the discovery channel. And that is the sort of overarching destiny-shaping power and world-altering manipulation that control freaks out there yearn for. (even if, I suppose if you were actually filming some sort of discovery channel show, you'd be tethered by crappy rules such as: having to depict actual reality) Of course, any game even attempting something like this was going to have some distinct conceptual limitations, and framing those as positives, when the entire concept of the game was about turning oneself into a god of this world, would be the prevailing challenge of the marketers. And considering how far they sold me, hook line and sinker, I'd call that a total success on Maxis' part. (although they were selling to a child, so take that for what you will.)

Spore starts with you as a germ on a space rock full of bacteria, and trying as hard as possible to survive a total underwater free-for-all battle for survival. Countless other gross single-cell monstrosities are trying to mindlessly eat their way to victory, and over millions of years you have to contend with that. Where it becomes clever is in the building system menus, wherein you get to build your cell to look how you want, but also to have the 'parts' that you want. Parts are addendums to the body, eyes, tails, vicious spikes, et cetera, which improve stats and shape how you look. As you slay more creatures and earn more 'DNA points' you can put better body parts on your creature, and already I'll bet you're starting to see the way in which the core concepts of evolution are going to work squashed into a video game economy. Works better than I thought it would, truth be told.

Whilst the chaos of cell mode is a lot of people's favourite stage, I was always further drawn in the creature mode, when your cell grows big enough to wiggle onto land and start a 3d adventure across the face of it's home planet. This is a part of the game that represents a more advanced version of the cell stage, with a little more flexibility to it other than 'kill everything and don't die'. There's food bars to have to deal with, influenced by the type of eating implements you've fitted your creatures' mouth with, a rudimentary diplomacy system where you get to play interpretive dances with other species and a Pokémon 'gotta catch 'em all' draw to it, in the way that new body parts are 'unlocked' by scouring skeletons for bones. It's in this stage that the creature you're making forms it's final look and ends as the mostly dominant species on the planet.

From there most people fell off the game, and it makes since because the promise of creativity sort of falls off too. Tribal and Civilisation mode are kind of like dime-store strategy game rip-offs, with Tribal stage being a simple RTS and Civilisation stage playing like your prototypical 4X game. Neither are particularly bad, it should be said, but neither offer the sort of appeal you could easily get from other specialised titles in their respective genres. This goes especially true for Space Stage, which was meant as the ever lasting endgame but often ranks as people's least favourite stage. Sort of juggling a 4X framework over a third person explorer gameplay. Imagine playing Stellaris, but you have to manually fly to each world in order to micromanage, then carve out a lot of the complexity so that most of the worlds can operate themselves but still need personal intervention sometimes, and you'll pretty much have the Space Stage in a nutshell. Oh, and there's Borg in that mode as well. Spore calls them Grox, and they guard the core of the galaxy. I guess they're pretty much what counts as 'main antagonists', if this game needed that. Apparently is does, and the Grox are it.

Before Maxis decided to perfect it's craft at draining the Sims fanbase dry, I think that Spore marked the very last step in their experimental teenage years, and that alone makes this worth a wisp of attention. It tries for too much at times, and falters, but I'd rather have a game that goes to be more than it can be, then one that purposefully neuters itself out of fear. My only shame for the game comes in the fact that, since Maxis are cash cows now, we'll never get the polished and refined sequel that a game like this could have definitely had. Or if we do get it now, we'd be inundated with creature part DLC packs ad nauseum for the next 8 years. So let the ambitious, flawed, masterpiece that was Spore persist as a relic of a crazier, freer, time for the gaming industry. (You'll never evolve into creature stage, poor Spore.) Oh, and I have absolutely no idea what Darkspore was, maybe I should look it up some time...